The joint work of international police forces, between Europe and the United States, made it possible to put an end to Lockbit's activities.
This is the group of hackers who, thanks to the ransomware of the same name, a type of computer virus that blocks computers, had affected numerous companies and institutions globally.
In Italy, the gang had managed to block a digital infrastructure used by the PA, in Germany several hospitals were affected and in the USA over 1,700 organizations.
As reported by Reuters online, the network was stopped thanks to Operation Cronos, jointly by the US and British authorities together with Europol.
Originally from Eastern Europe, since it was born in 2019, Lockbit had structured itself as a real pyramid criminal company.
The gang made money by stealing sensitive data and threatening to disclose it if the victims did not pay a ransom in cryptocurrency.
Its affiliates are criminal groups that Lockbit recruits to carry out attacks using its digital extortion tools.
Ransomware is malicious software that encrypts data, i.e. makes it inaccessible until a key is entered, which is not always provided by criminals even after receiving a payment.
According to information released, law enforcement agencies managed to breach Lockbit's servers via an infrastructure vulnerability.
The source code, chats and data on the victims were seized, also taking control of the affiliation panel with which the "customers" of the service could operate.
On Telegram, Reuters was contacted by a spokesperson for the group who reported that Lockbit has a copy of all the data obtained by the police, so it can replicate it elsewhere.
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